OFF97: Macro to Get Windows and Windows System Directories

• Microsoft Visual Basic for Applications included with:

      - Microsoft Word 97 for Windows
      - Microsoft Access versions 7.0, 97
      - Microsoft Excel 97 for Windows
      - Microsoft PowerPoint 97 for Windows
  

SUMMARY

The Microsoft Windows operating system provides two routines that can be called by Microsoft Office 97 programs to get the Windows and the Windows System directories.

MORE INFORMATION

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When Windows starts, it sets a special environment variable called "windir" with the path from which Windows was started. You can use the following macro instruction to post the Windows directory to a message box.

   MsgBox Environ$("windir")

The following macro example retrieves the Windows and Windows System directories and prints them to the Debug (Immediate) window inside the Visual Basic for Applications Editor.

' Place these declarations in the General Declarations procedure of a
' Visual Basic for Applications module.

   Declare Function GetWindowsDirectoryA Lib "Kernel32" _
   (ByVal lpBuffer As String, ByVal nSize As Long) As Long
   Declare Function GetSystemDirectoryA Lib "Kernel32" _
   (ByVal lpBuffer As String, ByVal nSize As Long) As Long

   Sub GetOSDirs()
      Dim sBuf As String
      Dim cSize As Long
      Dim retval As Long
      sBuf = String(255, 0)
      cSize = 255

      ' Get Windows Directory.
      retval = GetWindowsDirectoryA(sBuf, cSize)
      sBuf = Left(sBuf, retval)
      Debug.Print sBuf

      ' Get System Directory.
      sBuf = String(255, 0)
      cSize = 255
      retval = GetSystemDirectoryA(sBuf, cSize)
      sBuf = Left(sBuf, retval)
      Debug.Print sBuf
   End Sub